


Primary Care

by Molly



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Case Fic, Gen, Humor, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-04
Updated: 2010-09-04
Packaged: 2017-10-11 11:29:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/111945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Molly/pseuds/Molly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for spn_summergen, for Floranna -- for her prompt:  "Castiel and Dean are both hurt and Sam must take care of them." This is very nearly that! Kind of hurt/comfort, kind of angst, kind of humor, kind of case-fic.  Mostly banter and love.  :)</p><p><em>That was how they got you: turned you into a mushball, made you fetch blankets and Doritos and vodka, made you whine to Bobby Singer about the unfairness of your life.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	Primary Care

**Author's Note:**

  * For [floranna](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=floranna).



> Many, many thanks to my beta readers: terrio, destina, luzdeestrellas and tripoli8 for being kind, thorough, and awesome.

Three weeks of planning, a month tracking down the right incantations, a week to consecrate the knife and another to run the little bastards to ground. Sam felt good about it. Their groundwork was solid, their preparation exhaustive and complete. They were back in the saddle, at the top of their game, as relaxed and rested as Winchester genetics would allow. They breached the upper level of the warren at sunset, just like Cas had instructed. Sam was in the lead, his brother at his back, the silver glint of the knife their only guide. The closer they got to the hideously malformed Abaddonites, the brighter the blade became. For weeks, Dean had been calling it Sting.

Down a winding staircase, down a ladder, down a dark hall, down until the tiled walls turned to concrete and the concrete turned to stone, until the flickering fluorescent lights became flickering torches. Somewhere in the distance, water dripped, slow and steady; somewhere in the shadows nearby, unseen animals skittered past them and away. Below them, the ground vibrated, and a strange mechanical groan seemed to emanate from the walls.

"This is all getting a little too Buffyesque for me," Dean said, low and quiet.

Sam threw a look over his shoulder that was meant to convey 'shut the hell up, you moron,' but it must have landed closer to 'please elaborate.' Dean dropped his voice into a register usually reserved for earthquakes and thunderstorms and intoned, "_From beneath you, it devours_."

Sam refined the look with as much judgment and disgust as he could manage, holding a flashlight on his own face so Dean could see it.

"Touchy," Dean said in his normal voice. But it was his inside voice, at least, so Sam counted that as a win.

The floor of the tunnel sloped gently downward and to the left, taking them in a long, wide spiral toward the cavern Cas had told them to expect at the bottom. The air was dense and stuffy, and smelled sickly of sulfur. The torches spaced at random intervals along the walls guttered pathetically in their sconces, and some had been extinguished altogether. The backpack Sam carried -- filled with ammo, salt, kerosene, and holy water -- was getting heavier with every step.

"What the hell," Dean broke out finally, "are they _mole men_? We're at the center of the Earth, here. This is ridiculous."

Sam stopped in his tracks and turned around, glaring. Dean was already backing up a step, hands held up at shoulder height -- a gun in one of them, a pair of half-eaten Twizzlers in the other. "Seriously, Dean?"

Dean looked from the candy to Sam, and lowered his hands. "Oh, hey, sorry, dude. You want one?"

"No, I do not want one! I want you to be serious. I want you to be alert. And most of all," he finished in a low hiss, "_I want you to be quiet_."

"Geez," Dean muttered. "Bossy."

"You're going to get us killed!"

"Me? You're the one who dragged us down here. I wanted to hand this one off to Bobby and go to Sea World." Dean tore off a piece of candy with his back teeth, and grinned. "Anyway, Cas is on this one with us. He's not gonna let us flame out for a pack of bug monks."

"Look," Sam said, "I get that you're all gung ho about angels now that Cas is one again, and I'll be happy to go upstairs with you when the time comes. But personally, I'd rather punch my ticket for that ride in a far, far distant future, all right? For now I just want to kill some cultists, get some dinner, and go to bed. Can we do that? Please?" He let his chin tremble just a little. "For me?"

"Jesus fucking Christ." Dean tucked the Twizzlers back into his pocket and shoved Sam on ahead. "Put away the eyes, Rover. I'll go quietly."

Sam didn't bother to hide his triumphant grin. "Talk like that won't get you into Heaven," he said.  
 

* * *

   
Eventually, the tunnel ended, widening by gradual degrees until it formed an antechamber for the Great Hall on the other side. As expected, the Abaddonites were already deep into the ritual, their guttural voices rising and falling in a strange, atonal song. ("Like a Gregorian chant?" Sam had asked when Cas had tried to describe it to them; and Cas had said, "Yes. Only evil.") According to the plan, Sam was to wait until the chanting reached its peak ("You'll know") and bury the knife into the left eye of the guy in the middle while Dean read their own incantation off the back of a paper kid's menu from Denny's and anointed everybody he could reach with kerosene and matches.

The Cultists of Abaddon would be cleansed from the Earth with silver and fire, their environmentally unfriendly agenda would not be carried out, destruction would not be loosed upon the land. The Winchester Traveling Family Business could flip the sign on their door to 'closed' and go home. Or back to the motel, anyway, which was so close as to make no difference.

That was the plan.

_This_ was what happened:

The chanting did not reach its peak. It didn't reach its peak because it was interrupted, mid-chant. It was interrupted by a sudden, loud, wet explosion that Sam only identified later as a sneeze. There was a moment -- a single, silent moment when the chanting had stopped and the disturbingly insectile cries of 'kill the interlopers!' had not yet begun -- when all eyes were trained in shock and dismay on Dean. Sam's included.

Dean's own eyes were so wide they showed white all around the edges. He and Sam stared at each other, the wreckage of months of work and planning crashing down around them, a thread of crystal clear silent communication opening up between them: _Oh shit, What the hell, I didn't_ mean _ to, Fuck, Oh crap, RUN!_

They ran. The Abaddonites ran after them. They ran faster. After that -- well.

For a very long while after that, there was just a lot of running.  
 

* * *

   


  
Once Lucifer's cage opened, Sam expected the world to catch fire like he'd lit a match to it. He expected civilization to be washed away by the blood-dimmed tide, like Yeats had promised.

Instead, Armageddon staggered around the planet like the town drunk, knocking over people and buildings and entire townships at random intervals. A Horseman here, a Babylonian Whore there. A zombie plague somewhere along the way. Every now and then Lucifer would show up and menace him, or Zachariah would appear to demoralize Dean. It was a long, halting, exhausting shamble to the finish line. Looking back on the prelude to the most anticlimactic Apocalypse in the history of the word, what stood out most for Sam was that he and Dean fought a lot that winter.

Sam really hated fighting with Dean.

When it became obvious that getting Lucifer back into the cage was going to come down to Sam, he didn't really think of it in terms of making a choice. There were two things that could happen; one sucked, but the other was unacceptable. It was actually a little liberating, the idea that maybe he could somehow make up for all the ill-advised, stupid, and occasionally darkside crap he'd pulled in the past year.

The one thing that made him feel better about himself was that his own family drama was an After School Special compared to the epic, millennia-spanning cold war being waged between Heaven and Hell. His own pride didn't really hold a candle to Lucifer's, and Dean's good-little-soldier complex seemed almost healthy in comparison to Michael's. The idea that it all came down to a bunch of angels slugging out their daddy issues inside better-adjusted echoes of themselves was actually kind of funny when it wasn't mind-numbingly terrifying. Dean agreed with him completely, which had led to a long, heated, slightly-drunken mutual rant on the joys and benefits of familial communication that left Bobby hunched over his kitchen table with tears running down his cheeks, gasping for breath.

Sam honestly couldn't understand how _brothers_ could go millennia without at least attempting to talk it all out. But then, he and Dean had spent most of the Apocalypse working on their relationship -- so admittedly, their priorities were a little weird.  



  
 

* * *

   
Back in the motel room, Sam ripped off his jacket and hurled it onto his bed, followed by the consecrated knife and his backpack, and first one boot, then the other. He did all this in utter silence, while Dean stood behind him with a bright red nose, fuming.

"It's not like I planned it, Sam. It just happened."

"Two months of work," Sam said. "No, sorry, actually, it was two months of work for _me_."

"Hey, I helped!"

"In what universe does flirting with demonic librarians count as help, Dean?"

"The one where it got you your pretty glowy knife spell, dude. Look, I'm sorry, all right? If it makes you happy, I promise I'll never sneeze in your holier-than-thou presence again."

"I honestly can't think of a single thing you could do right now that would make me happy."

"Well, hell, Sam." Dean dropped onto his bed, elbows on his knees, and looked up at Sam with tired red eyes. "I haven't thought of anything I could do in the past thirty years that would make you happy. So welcome to the club."

"Don't say that," Sam snapped. He stared Dean down, exactly as pissed at him as he'd been a second ago, but for a completely different reason. Only Dean looked half-dead, like a faded photo of himself, and Sam's stupid protective instincts kicked in hard. "I mean it," he said, his temper failing him completely. "Don't you ever think that."

Dean visibly deflated. He looked away first, in favor of staring very pointedly at the fascinating sailboat photo on the wall. "Well, don't be such an asshole, then," he said, but Sam could hear the apology in it.

And just that fast, Sam wasn't mad anymore. It was like a fucking magic trick. He had no idea how Dean pulled it off, but it happened every time. He lowered himself to the bed across from Dean, and leaned over to lay the back of his hand across Dean's forehead. "You stop being such a head-case, and I will."

"So I'm a head-case, now," Dean said in a far lighter tone. He jerked back from Sam's hand like it had burned him, instead of the other way around. "Because I broke the sacred Hunter's rule against _sneezing._ Dad must have left that one out."

"Dude, you brought Twizzlers to a death ritual performed by insectile monks."

"I missed breakfast!"

"Look, I'm just worried about you." Sam fished in his duffle, pulled out a bottle of water, and handed it to his brother. "Drink that," he said. "All of it." He went back into his bag, pawing through clothes and books and way more chargers than they actually had electronics for, and finally came out with a bottle of extra strength Tylenol. He popped the cap and shook out three of them, passing them to Dean. "How long have you been feeling like shit?"

"Your bedside manner sucks," Dean grumbled, but he swallowed the pills, and the rest of the water, too. "Couple days," he admitted finally. "Figured it would pass." He chucked the empty bottle at the trash can by the door, missing by about a foot.

Sam watched it roll back toward them across the floor. "You've been off your game since I got back."

"Oh, God, we're gonna talk now."

"Yeah, we are. About your feelings. So drop the macho act and tell me what the fuck is going on, because I don't really feel right about sticking with the work like this if you're not into it."

Dean scrubbed a hand through his hair. "Seriously? We're doing this now? Me on my deathbed?"

"Before we go back out there. Yeah."

Dean shrugged out of his jacket and tossed it in the general direction of his pack, then let himself fall backwards, arms spread out to his sides. A sheen of sweat gleamed on his arms below the sleeves of his T-shirt. "It's not that I'm not into it," he said, staring up at the ceiling.

Sam nodded. "Okay," he said. "So what is it?"

He took his cue from Dean and didn't look at him, but he was hyper-aware of his brother's movements. He knew Dean's tells backwards and forwards, could read him like an open book. Dean was nervous. That made Sam nervous, too.

"It's just--"

"Hello."

Sam lurched to his feet, his heart pounding; beside him, Dean was doing the same plus getting ready to shoot. Castiel stood barely a foot in front of them, gazing at Dean's gun with a small frown. "Is this because I didn't knock?"

"Jesus, Cas." Dean lowered his gun hand, glaring. "I just about shot you in the head, you know that?"

"It would cause no lasting harm. I would simply reconstitute myself."

"Instant Angel: Just add _annoying_. I'll remember that the next time you swing by to drop off a coronary."

Cas inclined his head at Dean and said nothing.

"Well?" Sam said. "What are you doing here?"

"I came to congratulate you on your success."

"Yeah, well, two things, angelface." Dean popped the clip out of his gun, checked the chamber, then pointed the clip at Cas. "One, you need to step back about a foot so I can't tell what you had for dinner."

Cas took an obedient step back.

"And two," Sam finished for Dean, "we didn't exactly succeed."

"On the contrary. The ritual was stopped. The prophecy was not fulfilled. The Abaddonites have returned to their hibernating state until the next conjunction of the necessary celestial bodies, which will not occur for approximately six hundred and seventy-three years."

Sam exchanged a look with Dean. "Approximately," Sam said faintly.

"Yes."

Dean said, "Wait," and took a step forward into the space Cas had vacated at his request. He poked the clip at Castiel's chest again. "You're telling me we didn't actually have to waste any of those insect dudes? We just had to keep them from singing the land to death in a hundred mile radius?"

Cas raised his eyebrows. "Yes. The knife in the leader's eye, in combination with the incantation, would have destroyed them all instantaneously. But merely interrupting the ritual was enough to avert the disaster. I thought I had made that clear." He looked down at the clip Dean was holding. "Should I move further back?"

"And we did that," Dean said, his eyes cutting over to Sam for just a second. "We stopped it."

"Yes." Castiel looked so confused, Sam almost pitied him. "Thank you?"

"_I_ stopped it." Dean turned to Sam wearing a smile so smug it was practically unsanitary. "By _sneezing_. You caught that, right, little brother?"

Sam sighed, and dropped back onto the bed, and dropped his face into his hands. "Two months."

Dean raised a triumphant fist in the air. "I'm too awesome for this _world_," he said.  
 

* * *

   


  
Sacrificing his soul to trap Satan and avert Armageddon was not supposed to be something Sam bounced back from. He thought there would be eternal torment involved. At the very least he expected to be talked to death on a regular basis, that apparently being Lucifer's favorite form of torture. But Lucifer went radio silent as soon as Sam fell into the cage, and no torment ever actually occurred. Sam fell... and landed under a streetlamp five seconds later. Or five months, depending on who you asked.

Cas didn't know who did it. Crowley didn't know who did it. Bobby and Sam sure as hell didn't know who did it.

Dean, though. For reasons not entirely clear to Sam, Dean thought God did it. So from the moment Sam showed up on his doorstep, God was all right by Dean.

All was forgiven.   



  
 

* * *

   
"You go," Dean said from the bed, where the blankets and pillows from both beds had nearly swallowed him alive. "Take Cas for backup. I'll be fine."

Sam stood halfway between the bed and the door, indecisive. Hibernating or not, they couldn't just let a bunch of bug-monks hang out beneath the Bexford County Library for the next six hundred years; somebody needed to go down there and set fire to them. But Dean's face was both pale and flushed, depending on what spot you looked at, his eyes were glassy and bloodshot, and more green goop had come out of his nose in the past hour than Sam liked to witness outside of a hunt.

"Can't you just fix him?" Sam asked Castiel.

"You know I'm not permitted to use my powers to manipulate Earthly events."

"It's not an event. It's a one-man plague."

Dean shifted uncomfortably in the bed. "I'm not sick. I'm just a little tired. And I have low blood sugar. All I ate today was licorice."

"Yeah, Dean, whatever. You're the kind of tired that usually comes with biohazard level four containment precautions, but you're not _sick_."

"I'm not!"

Castiel looked at Sam. "I believe he is lying to protect his self-image. Perhaps a doctor--"

"No," Dean said emphatically. "No way. No doctors. All I need is a cheeseburger, a beer, and the remote, and I'll be up and running in no time."

"I feel weird about leaving him alone like this," Sam confided to Castiel in a low voice. "He reverts to age three when he's sick. Look, you stay with him, and I'll--"

"You're not going by yourself," Dean said flatly. "I will come off this bed if I have to, Sam."

"And what?" Sam went to the foot of the bed and put his hands on his hips, looking Dean up and down. "Fall on me? You're not going anywhere."

"Well, somebody has to, and I'm way safer alone here with the sniffles and the SyFy channel than you would be by yourself with a bunch of bug-monks who may or may not be light sleepers."

Sam rubbed at his temple and forehead with one hand, eyes clenched shut. He had a headache coming on -- maybe from the flu, but more likely from Dean's excess of personality. There was no winning this, not for him; not without drastic measures involving rope or handcuffs or tranquilizers. Dean was the most stubborn son of a bitch Sam had ever known when he was dead wrong; when he was actually right about something, he was downright unstoppable.

"Okay," he said finally. "I'll go. I'll take Cas."

"Brilliant idea," Dean said generously. "I'm totally behind it."

"You're sure you'll be okay?"

"I'm not _sick_!"

"Right," Sam said, "you're just tired. So you'll rest, right?"

"I'll sleep like a baby, as soon as I'm done watching _Omen III_."

"That movie sucked," Sam pointed out. "And Damien was a crappy Antichrist."

"Don't worry, Sammy," Dean said, smiling warmly. "You'll always be my favorite."  
 

* * *

   


  
In times of trouble, Winchesters tended to band together. Of course, ever since Sam had been old enough to know he was a Winchester, there'd only been the three of them. Banding together usually led to a whole lot of shouting -- and once Sam was tall enough to hold his own against Dean, a couple of fistfights here and there. Still, even Sam knew that wasn't the part that mattered. What mattered was, they had each other's backs.

Bobby's last name might be Singer, but he was kind of a Winchester all the same. Sam loved Bobby without reservation, the way he'd always wanted to love Dad but never quite managed. The father they got the first time had always done his best for them, even when his best had sucked, so Sam would never call Bobby a father out loud. But that was what Bobby was -- or the closest thing to one they still had in the world. He was a good one, too: just as tough as he had to be, and always, always there.

Castiel was nobody's father, and he was never going to be a brother, either. He had too many brothers of his own. But he was around a lot, and he was on their side, and he was pretty good in a fight. He was there when they needed him. And he knew things, important things he would sometimes tell them if they asked the right questions, kind of like an ineffable heavenly Google.

So, he couldn't really use his powers to help them anymore. And maybe he sometimes seemed less like an angel on their shoulders and more like a slightly stupid child Sam and Dean were raising together against their will, but whatever. Cas had saved Bobby and Dean when Sam couldn't. He knew how to band together when the chips were down. That made him Winchester enough for Sam.  



  
 

* * *

   
As it happened, the insect monks weren't light sleepers. But they did wake up fast and mean when set on fire.

"Fuck, that hurts." Sam craned his head around as far as he could to assess the burn damage to the back of his shoulder. Not being Linda Blair, he couldn't see a thing. "How bad is it?"

"Extremely." Castiel leaned in for a closer look. "You have bubbles under your skin."

"Blisters. They're called blisters. Probably looks worse than it is." Sam flexed his arm and winced. "Or not. How big is it?"

"Approximately the size of my hand," Cas said, demonstrating.

Sam let out a scream and jerked away. It was a scream that he was going to translate into a manly bellow for Dean when he told the story back at the motel. "Ow! Don't _touch_ it!"

"Sorry."

"We need a new plan." Sam carefully pulled his shirt back over the burn, trying not to flinch when the fabric brushed against it. "They're like flaming pinballs. We need a way to hold them down before we light 'em up."

"We have no tools for that."

"There's a pretty long sword in the trunk of the car." Sam looked back at the mouth of the passageway, thinking of the spiraling mile of tunnel between him and the Impala. "Not going to help us up there, though."

"Ah. Perhaps..." Castiel looked at the passageway, too; then he...flickered. Sam raised his eyebrows. "Here." Cas handed Sam a gleaming steel sword.

"I thought you weren't supposed to use your powers down here."

"Not to affect the outcome of human affairs." As Sam watched, a faint but definite tinge of pink spread over Castiel's face. "I merely saved you a trip you would have made on your own anyway. The rule doesn't apply."

"Uh-huh."

"It doesn't, Sam."

"Right." Sam hefted the sword experimentally. "Well, thanks."

"I did nothing you couldn't have--"

"Cas." Sam put a hand on the angel's shoulder and gave it a small shake.

"Right," Cas said. "Sorry."

"Operation flaming bug-monk," Sam said, "take two."

Sword in hand, Castiel one step behind, Sam set off toward the next pod. This one was affixed to the wall with thin, ropy strands of dark yellow goo that gave off an ammonia-like smell -- like urine taffy, Sam thought, and then immediately wished he could unthink it.

"Okay," he said. "We'll just count that last one as a trial run, okay? You squirt the pod with kerosene, I'll stab this sword through it and back off. Then you throw a match at it. Sound good?"

"What if the sword is not sufficient to pin the monk?"

It was a legit concern. The sword wasn't exactly Excalibur; it wasn't going to lodge deep in the rock, and skewering an Abaddonite barely slowed it down. Sam was counting on the bottom of the pod being thick enough to give the sword some purchase. Otherwise, the bug-monk was going to come screaming off the wall in flames, just like the last one had, and Sam was going to get another bug-hug flambé. Considering he'd barely survived the first one, that didn't bode well for his safety.

"It'll be fine," Sam said, carefully not meeting Castiel's eyes. "Just don't throw the match too soon."

"I will wait for your signal."

"My signal is going to be backing up really fast and yelling."

"Then I will wait for that."

Sam examined Cas for any sign of sarcasm or facetiousness, and found nothing. He was really, really starting to miss Dean. "On one," he said. "Three, two..."

Castiel painted the pod with kerosene on one, as planned. Sam stabbed it immediately and jumped back. Cas threw the match, the pod went up in flames. The monk inside the pod burned with it. Sam's planning skills were _awesome_. He had to wait till the flames died down before retrieving the sword, which was very, very hot and burned his hand enough to raise another blister. But the point was, everything else worked. He turned to Cas to congratulate him on a job well done.

"That was great," he said. "You-- hey. What's wrong?" Castiel's face was a pale, sickly grey.

"Nothing."

"You look like you've seen a ghost," Sam said. "Except I've seen you see a ghost, and it actually looks nothing like this. You look really pale."

"It's been a very long winter."

"And you're sweating."

"The fire is overly warm."

Sam took a step closer, peering at Castiel's eyes. They were bloodshot and glassy. "Are you... Castiel. Are you _sick_?"

"I'm an Angel of the Lord." Castiel drew himself up to his full height, which -- him still impersonating Jimmy Novak -- was not really all that impressive. It was even less impressive when he started to wobble.

Sam grabbed his shoulder to steady him. "You're an Angel of the Lord with the flu."

"I am immune to all Earthly infections. This is... something else."

"Well, maybe it's swine flu." Sam didn't know the difference between regular flu and swine flu, but he was pretty sure the swine variety was worse.

"Angels do not get pig viruses!"

Sam checked Castiel's forehead. Warm. Very, very warm. He supposed it could be from the flaming bug monk. Or maybe angels naturally ran hot -- Sam didn't usually get quite this personal with them. "You've got something," he said. "Dean's sick, and now you're sick, too. If it's not the flu, then..." An unpleasant idea occurred to him. "Maybe Dean's not sick with the flu either. Maybe it's something worse. Something supernatural, something that can affect angels, too."

"That is unlikely."

"We have to go check on him. If this is something like that zombie plague--"

"Sam." Castiel grasped Sam's arm. "Dean is in no immediate danger. I would know."

"How would you know?"

"I would sense it."

Sam's eyes narrowed. "_How_ would you sense it? I thought you weren't supposed to be able to sense us anymore. Wasn't that the whole point of the graffiti on our ribs?"

Castiel pointed his red, glassy eyes at the ground. "I would prefer not to speak of it."

"Oh, well," Sam said. "If you'd prefer not to speak of it..." He jerked his arm away. "_Too bad_! What the hell is going on?"  
 

* * *

   


  
After the end of the world was called on account of Winchesters, Sam gave a lot of thought to the idea of going back to school and picking up where his old life had left off. This was largely because Dean couldn't manage to shut up about it.

Dean's argument, as Sam understood it, was that Sam had always intended to continue his education; that Sam had always believed a normal life would make him happy; and that the few brief years of normal life Sam actually got had made him happy at the time. Therefore, returning to the place where his demon friends and demon professors and demon God-knows-what-else had manipulated him and eventually murdered his girlfriend should make him happy all over again.

Sam didn't think much of Dean's logic.

What Dean failed to consider, because he was Dean, was that Dean also made Sam happy, and had done so since Sam was old enough to toddle after him without falling on his little fat face. He made Sam mad, he made Sam irrational, and sometimes he made Sam want to light him on fire -- but he also made Sam feel normal in a way that Stanford never had. He pushed Sam to care about the world in concrete terms -- with his brain and his heart, yeah, but also with guns, knives, and fists applied as needed. Sam had spent so much of his life in his own head that it took a long time for those lessons to fully sink in.

It took even longer to figure out most of that was bullshit. Dean cared about the world after family, and he cared about himself with what was left after caring about Sam. Once Sam sorted that part out, there was no chance he was ever going to leave; Dean had mental problems and clearly needed looking after.

Sam found them a job in Maine, and after that, Massachusetts, and after that, Providence. He could have kept going -- New England had a fuckload of ghosts, and he had the _Toronto Sun_ bookmarked on his laptop for when they finished those off. But Dean's arguments got weaker and weaker, and he stopped looking at Sam like he was trying to memorize him. He started going out again some nights and stopped chewing with his mouth closed at breakfast. He relaxed.

Sam stopped pinning them to the Eastern Seaboard. Stopped monitoring Dean's moods like a walking barometer. He stopped reminding Dean that he wasn't going anywhere, because eventually, Dean stopped needing to hear it.  



  
 

* * *

   
"I'm sorry," Sam said, not believing what he'd just heard. "You did what?"

Cas refused to meet his eyes. "I formed a spiritual bond with your brother."

"A bond. Like--" Sam tried to find a proper simile and came up empty. "Like a _bond_ bond?"

"Angels are sent to the Earth to protect and guide humans only under certain very specific circumstances and only in certain very special cases. When such a case and circumstance arises, a member of a specific caste of angels is assigned the task." Castiel put his hands in the pockets of his trench coat, then took them out again. Then put them back in. He looked... twitchy. Not something Sam was used to seeing on angelic faces. "I was assigned to your brother, and in order to fulfill my task it was necessary to monitor his well-being. This is a common practice, though usually a bond is only created to protect small children--"

"Children," Sam said. "Angels form bonds with children? Wait." He held up his hand before Cas could spout more convoluted nonsense at him. "Let's skip how unbelievably creepy that sounds. A certain caste, you said. What caste?"

Cas sighed. "The guardian caste."

"Guardian...angels."

"Yes."

"You're Dean's actual guardian angel."

Cas shifted his weight awkwardly. "I would rather you didn't speak of this to your brother in those terms."

Sam's eyes widened. "You slapped a guardian angel _soul bond_ on Dean... and he doesn't even know about it?"

Castiel's hands twitched again. "Just a little one," he said.  
 

* * *

   
They left with most of the Abaddonites still hibernating away, undisturbed by the blazing deaths of their pals. Cas assured Sam they'd still be there in the morning, and it wasn't like Sam suddenly didn't trust him. He was pissed, not stupid.

Really, really, really, really pissed.

Sam didn't say much on the way back to the motel. He didn't have to. Cas was more than willing to fall all over himself explaining how he'd done nothing wrong or even out of the ordinary, how he was sure Dean wouldn't actually mind, how there was really no reason at all to tell him.

"It did not allow me to track or locate you," Cas told him when they were settled in the car. He'd stopped sneezing for the moment, but his face was an unhealthy shade of green, and he wasn't very steady on his feet. His voice sounded like tectonic plates grinding together. "I was not privy to Dean's thoughts, nor did I influence him in any way."

Sam hadn't even thought about that possibility. Now it completely wigged him out. The idea of Cas spying on them was bad enough; the possibility of actual manipulation made Sam's hair stand on end. "Angels can do that?"

Cas looked at Sam warily, and after a moment said in a tentative voice, "No?"

Sam rolled his eyes. "Your positive spin isn't very positive," he informed Cas, pulling out onto the street.

"I just want to reassure you that your safety was never compromised."

"It's not that I don't believe you," Sam said slowly, as if he were explaining it to a very small child. "It's just that I don't care. You latched yourself onto my brother's mind without his consent. At the very least, that's tacky. At worst, it's a violation of his trust."

"Technically, it's his soul I'm bonded to."

"Like that makes it better?" Sam slammed the car to a stop at a red light, throwing Cas forward against his seatbelt. It was satisfying in a petty way Sam wasn't proud of, but didn't regret at all. "Either way, I'm probably gonna have to punch you for it at some point. Unless Dean gets there first."

"If corporal punishment is customary under the circumstances, I accept your decision."

"I got it right out of the _What To Do When an Angel Violates You_ handbook, passed down through the ages."

Castiel tilted his head to one side, as if he were listening to a distant translator. "Ah," he said after a moment. "That was sarcasm."

"It runs in my family," Sam said.

It was a lot to process. Guardian angels, _bonds_, mystical germ-sharing -- seriously, what the Hell? He wasn't sure if it was the actual germs or the symptoms of the germs making Castiel sick, but something was. Sicker by the minute. It made him worry about Cas, which was kind of annoying considering how mad Sam was, and it made him worry about Dean, which was kind of dangerous considering how fast they were going. He forced his foot to lighten up on the gas pedal.

"I apologize," Cas said eventually. "I should have spoken of this sooner."

"It would've been nice," Sam said, "yeah."

"The bond imparts no information beyond basic physical and emotional well-being."

"Bet that made the last year or so a lot of fun for you."

"From the moment I retrieved your brother from Hell, I experienced a steadily-increasing level of discomfort that gradually became excruciating as the necessity of your sacrifice became more obvious."

Sam swallowed hard, his hands tightening on the wheel as he pulled into a spot in front of their room. He killed the engine, but didn't get out of the car. Didn't even take off his seat belt.

"I didn't mean for that to happen," he said quietly. "I didn't have any other choice."

"It was one of the bravest acts I've ever witnessed." Castiel's gaze was fixed on the door to their hotel room, but Sam didn't think he was seeing it. "Humans are capable of great selflessness. I confess I didn't expect you to succeed, but you were stronger than any of us imagined." He turned to look at Sam, a faint smile on his lips. "Except for your brother, of course."

"If you're trying to butter me up so I don't rat you out to Dean the second we get through the door... it's working."

"I'm telling you the truth, Sam. You're the best damned person I know."

"Uh, thanks," he said, startled. That was a lot, coming from a freaking angel. Kind of a ringing endorsement, considering he'd been on Heaven's most-wanted list for most of the past five years or so. Sam felt ridiculously flattered by it -- until he realized Castiel was speaking literally.

"Thanks," he said again, in a completely different tone.

Castiel's eyes widened. "Not that you're damned any more," he said quickly. "Barring any future evil acts, the services you've rendered to Heaven in recent years have more than assured your soul a place there."

Sam clenched his teeth. "I feel so much better."

"You're still a very good person," Castiel said, a tinge of desperation underlying the words.

Sam let go of the steering wheel. "Let's just go inside."  
 

* * *

   
The room was like a furnace. Sam started sweating the second he walked through the door. There was no sign of Dean, but the television was blaring something very dramatic about wormholes, and there was a large shivering ball of something on Dean's bed, still rolled up in both sets of blankets. Castiel took off his trench coat and immediately headed for the bathroom, his face an unsightly shade of grey. Sam winced a little on Cas's behalf, and went to turn the TV down. Dean's voice, pathetic and thick, rasped out, "I was watching that."

"Uh-huh." Sam stepped up to the bed. All that was visible of Dean was the very top of his head and a curl of fingers over the top edge of one blanket. "What happened?"

"It's fucking freezing in here, is what happened," Dean said. "And I'm out of tissues." His head lolled weakly against his pillow. "Did you bring me anything? I think I need some soup."

Sam's eyes rolled up to the ceiling. "Seriously?" he said. "After all I've done for you? _Seriously_?"

"Fine," Dean snapped, and started to struggle his way out of his cocoon. "I'll go myself--"

"I wasn't talking to you." Sam pushed Dean back down onto the bed; it was disturbingly easy. "I was talking to God."

Dean's eyebrows went up. "I didn't think you did that anymore."

"I just do it a little different now."

"Any luck?"

"No. Don't think he cares for my attitude these days," Sam said. "But it's a lot more satisfying now than it used to be."

"Well, don't get too cocky." Dean curled himself deeper into the covers, his eyes burning with fever in their sockets as he watched Sam. "Won't be much of a Heaven without you in it. Tormenting you till the end of time is part of my Eternal Reward."

"Yeah," Sam said. He smiled and tucked the covers tighter around Dean's chin. "That'll be great. Just me and you and your fondest memory of getting laid."

Dean made a snuffly sound that was probably meant to be a snort, but it ended in a coughing fit that made Sam's hands itch to grab him. Just to hold his bones together till it passed. He didn't; Dean wouldn't thank him for it. But he hovered, because that was what Dean let him get away with, and in a minute Dean was able to shift onto his back again and breathe.

"Ash said, special cases," Dean wheezed. "You and me, we're pretty special. Saved the world and all."

Sam gave in; he put a hand on Dean's shoulder and squeezed, reassuring himself that Dean was more solid, stronger, than he looked at the moment. He nodded, not really trusting his voice; not trusting himself to say the right thing even if he managed to speak.

He patted Dean's shoulder again, smiling down at him, then let go. "I'm going to call the desk for some extra blankets," he said.

"Awesome."

"Then I'll see about some meds and dinner. And something for you guys to drink. I think you're supposed to stay hydrated." With the exception of watching Jessica mope around their apartment with a box of Kleenex and a bottle of Nyquil once a year in school, Sam's experience with colds and the flu was pretty minimal. "Juice or something," he said, frowning. "Gatorade?"

"Rum," Cas said in a ragged voice, leaning weakly against the frame of the bathroom door. "A lot."  
 

* * *

   
Sam's shopping list

* Rum  
* Coke  
* Gummy bears  
* Bailey's  
* Robitussin  
* Dr. Pepper  
* Puffs (with lotion)  
* Vodka  
* Doritos (cool ranch)  
* Doritos (nacho)  
* Pringles  
* 4 Quarter Pounders with cheese (no onions)  
* 2 Big Macs  
* 2 large fries  
* "And pick yourself up a salad or something, Sammy. Can't have our nanny going hungry, right?"

Sam had no idea how Dean expected to eat half that crap with a bum stomach and snot oozing out of every orifice. How much of it Castiel intended to snarf up himself was anybody's guess, but the Quarter Pounders were his, along with both bags of Doritos. Sam was no doctor, but he thought they were both being ridiculously optimistic. They'd probably drink a little, take some Nyquil, and pass out trying to open the can of Pringles. He doubted Castiel could die of Dean's cold, though he looked like he already had by the time Sam left for the store, and Dean was unlikely to die of a virus when neither Heaven nor Hell could kill him. None of that was the problem.

The problem was, there was still a narcoleptic coven of bug-monks under the library, and now Sam was on his own. Really, really on his own.

"Arizona?" he said into his cell phone, steering back toward the motel over rain-slicked streets. "Seriously? What's so evil in Arizona?"

"Vampire werewolves," Bobby said, "and don't ask me which one. It's both."

"Vampires and werewolves?"

"Werewolves that are also vampires. Hate the sun, sprout fangs and fur at the full moon. Well, more fangs." The disgust in Bobby's voice came through clear as day. "Hell if I know how it happened. Probably one of your demon pals got cute and started splicing things."

Sam grinned in spite of himself. "I'm not the one who plays poker with one two Thursdays a month."

Bobby grunted, which was a more eloquent reply than Sam had expected, so he called it a direct hit. "Anyway, you're on your own with the bird flu boys. Just pour all the alcohol down their throats, that should kill whatever it is eventually. Keep 'em knocked out as much as you can. The monks ain't going anywhere."

Sam knew that; didn't mean he wanted to put it off, though. More to the point, he'd kind of hoped he could take care of the Abaddonites while Bobby took care of Dean and Cas. "You sure you can't just torch 'em all and head back north?"

"Y'all set off another Armageddon, give me a buzz," Bobby said. "Short of that, I'd rather cozy up to ten nests of Werepires than try to nursemaid a Winchester through so much as a hangnail."

Sam would, too. That was the whole point. "You should give me a call in a few days," Sam said, resigned. "Make sure I made it."

Bobby laughed. "You held off the Apocalypse with nothing but a bunch of jewelry and a classic car, Sam. You can handle a little angel snot without me."

"Looks like I'm going to have to." Sam drummed his fingers against the steering wheel. "All right. I'll play nurse maid, but I can't handle a sick brother, a sick angel _and_ all the bug-monks. You know of anybody nearby who could pick up some slack?"

"Got a few ideas," Bobby said, in a cheerful voice Sam didn't particularly trust. "Let me make some calls. I'll get back to you."  
 

* * *

   


  
In Sam's earliest memory he was five years old or somewhere close to it, tan and happy and "round as a tick," Dean said, chucking Sam under his chin and grinning down from a very great height. "Gonna have to run some of that off you soon, Sammy, or people will think I only feed you pizza and ice cream."

Sam didn't want to run. He couldn't keep up with Dean's longer legs, and he hated making Dean hold back and wait for him. It always made Dean mad when Sam fell behind, and he didn't like it when Dean was mad. Sam was still too young to process much beyond "happy," "sad," and "mad" at the time; he didn't get that Dean was angry at himself for going too fast. He just knew it made Dean cuss and come back and tug Sam along a little faster, and glare at everything he laid eyes on for a while.

Sometimes Sam wondered if Dean ever understood how scary that was for a little kid, to have his favorite person in the world yank his arm too hard, or squeeze it a little too tight. Sam knew most of the time then, and all of the time now, that Dean would never in a million years do anything to hurt him on purpose. But back then Sam's boat rose and fell in the wake of Dean's weather, and all that was good in his life depended on fair skies.

That summer Dean was tall and wiry, narrow as a fence post, nut-brown from the sun and freckled all over. He wore a stained white T-shirt most days over blue jeans and wrecked-grey sneakers with the strings just about falling apart. He could shoot a gun; Sam had seen him do it. Dad had showed him how out back, and Sam had watched from the window when he was supposed to be taking a nap. He could cook eggs and bacon without supervision, not that they had them to cook most of the time, and he could fight two boys his own size or maybe even a little bit bigger and win every time. Sam knew that because Dean came home with a bloody nose and a bruise swelling up around his eye a couple times a week all summer, and all he'd ever do was grin and tell Sam, "Yeah, but you should see those Boylston boys."

The Boylston boys were the bane of the young Winchesters' existence for three long hot months in southern Louisiana, just outside Morgan City. It seemed like the only breeze that ever blew that summer carried sweet acrid smoke straight down their throats from out of the cane fields. The Boylston boys, ten and thirteen years old, had hit their growth spurt somewhere around Sam's age and kept on growing. They'd learned meanness at their mama's knee; Sam could still remember her yelling for them from under the carport of their house, big blue housecoat hanging limp around her ankles. She always stopped just at the edge of the shade and screeched "like a banshee," Dean whispered to Sam where they crouched inside their rental house, up on their knees at the window, waiting to see if the boys would go in. Dean couldn't tell him what a banshee was, just that they screeched a lot, and the more Sam asked the more Dean clammed up until eventually he stormed off to their room and slammed the door.

Sam quit asking after that, because even then, five years old, there was a lot of stuff he just knew not to ask about.

"Okay, so you hold it like this," Dean said, and showed Sam how to put the heaviest part of the rock in the center of his palm and how to curl his finger around the narrower part. "Feel how heavy that is? Heavy ones you can throw further, and if you hit something with them, it hurts more."

Sam hefted the cool green rock, feeling the grain of it run against his skin, and looked up at Dean to find out what came next.

"So then you just wind 'er up and throw." Dean did it like the baseball players did on TV, the pitchers, getting his legs into it and twisting his whole body to gather its power. The rock left his hand like a bullet and hit the can on the fence railing dead center, knocking it to the ground.

Sam didn't think he could do that, but he tried, and when he missed, he tried again. He kept thinking Dean would be upset, because Sam couldn't hit anything. But Dean just showed him again every time, clapped when he got close, ruffled his hair when he missed by a mile. Looking back on it, Sam didn't know where his brother got that patience. Sam didn't have it, and Dad sure as hell didn't, either.

He was on about his twelfth try, ready to go again, when the Boylston boys crossed over the end of their own driveway and slouched into Dean and Sam's back yard.

There wasn't any negotiating with those boys, not ever, and Dean didn't even try. He looked at Sam and said, "Get inside, now," and then he scooped up a handful of rocks while he ran straight at them. He was quick and graceful and he went after them like a rocket, firing shot after shot into their stomachs and chests until their cussing turned to yelling and they turned and tried to get away.

Sam picked up a few rocks of his own and ran at them, fast as his chubby legs would carry him. They were in full flight by the time he reached Dean and passed him, and his aim was terrible. But it wasn't right for Dean to fight two bigger boys at once, by himself, and so he threw rock after rock in their direction, shouting as loud as he could. One of the rocks went wild and hit the older boy right in the back of the head, almost took him off his feet.

Sam was too big to lift but Dean grabbed him up anyway and half-carried, half-dragged him back to the house. At first he thought Dean was yelling at him, his face was all screwed up and red and his whole body was shaking. But he was laughing, laughing like a wild thing, grinning so hard it nearly split his face.

"Man, oh man," Dean crowed when he could breathe, "did you see those kids run? Like the boogey man was after them! They won't be messing with the Winchesters again any time soon, I can tell you." He hooked an arm around Sam's neck and pulled him into a bear hug, smushing Sam's face against his chest. "You did all right," he said, and Sam's face went red-hot. "But next time I tell you to get inside, Sam, you get inside, all right? Or you'll find yourself having rocks for dinner. I fight the bad guys around here, not you."

Sam remembered the way Dean smacked him on the side of the head, not enough to hurt but enough to knock him over. He remembered laughing as he fell and Dean pouncing on him, and tickling the rest of the giggles out of him. But mostly he remembered the way those Boylston boys ran, and the way Dean smiled at him after.

It was the first time he could remember Dean calling him _Sam_. It made everything make sense to his five-year-old self, and it still made sense to him now. Sammy was the snot-nosed little boy who needed looking after.

_Sam_ was the kid who threw rocks, and looked after his brother.  



  
 

* * *

   
They were sleeping.

Cas was on the bed closest to the door, blue dress shirt unbuttoned to his navel, shoes still on. He sprawled across the sheets, limbs flung wide, like he was trying to get them as far away from him as possible. His head was tipped back against a thin, flat pillow and he was snoring: a low buzz punctuated by random gurgles, like he was trying to breathe under water.

Dean still had both blankets and was tangled deep inside them. Curled on his side, hands palm to palm under his cheek, he looked about ten years old. His hair stuck up in damp spikes, and sweat gleamed on his forehead. Sam hoped that meant his fever had broken. He'd heard something about that once on TV, though it might have come from Dr. Sexy.

Sam dropped the grocery bags onto the table, and the blankets he'd picked up from the office onto Cas. Then he dropped himself into a plastic chair. He was exhausted, way more than he should be after a little grocery run. The blisters on his hand and his back hurt like hell, and he'd forgotten to pick up burn cream. It had been a long day, and a long night before it with nothing but a catnap in the car on the way to the Abaddonite caverns. He wanted sleep like fish want water, but it didn't seem to be in the cards.

He didn't really want to wake them up, not when they seemed to be sleeping peacefully. But maybe some of the Nyquil would help them sleep even better. And rum aside, he really did think getting some liquid into them would help. It would help Dean at least, and if he was understanding it right, what helped Dean would help Castiel, too.

He stood between the beds, looking from one of them to the other. Dean was completely still, like he usually was when he slept hard. Didn't pay to do a lot of thrashing around when you were at your most defenseless. Too many years of tin soldiering had drilled caution so deep into Dean it even invaded his sleep. Cas was different; shifting, smacking his lips together, arms and legs twitching at random intervals like he had a live wire running through him.

Stupid cute, the both of them. Sam sighed, fighting off a rush of affection. That was how they got you: turned you into a mushball, made you fetch blankets and Doritos and vodka, made you whine to Bobby Singer about the unfairness of your life. He turned toward Dean's bed and gave the frame a solid kick.

"Wake up, sunshine," he said loudly, and kicked the bed again.

Dean's arm flailed out from the blankets' stranglehold. "What!" he demanded, bewildered by the sudden jolt. "What?"

"Meds." Sam ripped the protective plastic cover off the top of the Nyquil bottle, opened the child-proof cap, and poured out a slug at twice the recommended dosage. "Bottoms up," he said, handing it to his brother.

Dean swallowed, too worn out to bother complaining about the taste. He made an epic face at it, shuddered, and handed the cup back to Sam. He made a move to resume his new favorite position, but Sam grabbed his arm before he could dive back in. "Now this," he said, and poured a few shots of Gatorade into a glass. He left that one with Dean, then repeated the procedure with Cas -- whose understanding of the medication process was extremely limited, and who did not appreciate being awakened.

"I'm not physically sick," Castiel said, his voice low and rough. He gave Sam a significant look, eyes rolling wildly in their sockets. "Tend to Dean, and I'm sure I will improve on my own."

"You may not be sick, but you're still having symptoms." If an angel could psychically sick from earthly germs, maybe he could get psychically better from earthly meds. It was worth a shot, anyway; Sam shoved the plastic medication cup at him again. "Drink it."

"It is unnecessary."

"Drink it, or the rum stays in the bottle."

Cas drank, muttering darkly about the cruel streak Sam may or may not have picked up in Hell. He drank the Gatorade, too, once Sam convinced him it would kill the taste of the Nyquil. By the time he was done, he was too tired to ask about the rum, which was exactly what Sam had expected and intended. Sam tucked a blanket in close around him, partly to keep him warm and partly to keep him from fidgeting himself off the bed.

Once they were both back on the way to their respective comas, Sam grabbed some food for himself, and sat down to eat and catch his breath. He was starving, the kind of hungry that made his stomach hurt. He tried to count back to see how long he'd been awake and how long since his last meal, but he couldn't hold onto the numbers in his head. Too long, and too long. He needed food and sleep and a shower, in exactly that order.

He ripped the wrapper off a burger and had it halfway to his mouth when somebody started banging loud and long at the door.

Dean came up out of the blankets again, but he only made it onto his elbows before Sam got to the door. He waved at Dean to stay put and held up a finger for silence. Dean nodded, his hand curling under his pillow to grasp the knife he always kept there, just in case. Sam could see he was trying to have Sam's back like he always did, but he was fluff-headed with fever and sleep and for all practical purposes, useless. Castiel, of course, never moved a muscle.

Sam peered through the peephole, hand on his gun -- not really worried, but cautious, and definitely annoyed. When he saw who was on the other side of the door, he said a couple of extremely unfriendly things about Bobby in his head.

Tall, grizzled, face like a bad patch of asphalt, already impatient and irritated, and he hadn't even laid eyes on a Winchester yet. He had the proportions of a bobble-head through the weird scope of the peephole, and while Sam watched, he leaned in, one giant scary eyeball trying to peer into the room.

"It's okay," he said to Dean, "relax," and Dean dropped back onto the bed like his strings had been cut. His eyes were drifting closed before he hit the mattress.

Sam yanked the door open mid-bang. Before Rufus could open his mouth, Sam stepped outside, leaving the door open just a crack behind him. "Keep it down," he said quietly, "I just got them back to sleep."

"Well, well, well." Rufus eyed Sam up and down, dark eyes quick and alert. Sam stood there for it; he got it a lot, lately, whenever they came across other hunters on the road. "Sam Winchester. From martyr to male nurse in the blink of God's eye. That's one half-assed happily ever after, you ask me."

Sam reached out a hand and Rufus shook it, which was better than they'd managed the last time they ran into each other. Holy water-boarding and salt in his eyes; oh, yeah. Those were the good old days, all right. "Rufus," Sam said. "That the only shirt you own?"

"Flatters my figure. That the funniest joke you know?"

Sam laughed. "Yeah, today it is."

"That's pretty damn pathetic," Rufus said. There was a twist to his mouth that could've been either humor or disgust; Sam couldn't tell, and he wasn't about to ask. "All right, kid. Singer said you were righteous again, and you don't look too Satanic to me, so I guess we're good. I hear you got some trouble."

Sam cut his eyes to the door, then back to Rufus. The quick math said trying to leave Rufus in charge of the sick ward was a non-starter. He was a good guy, but he wasn't handicapped by affection for them the way Bobby was. As far as Sam knew, Rufus wasn't handicapped by affection for anybody.

"Not trouble, exactly," Sam said, resigned. "If you can keep your voice down, come on in, and I'll lay it out for you."

Rufus didn't wait to be offered dinner; he took a seat at the table and grabbed a burger and fries on his own. Sam ran it down for him while they stuffed their faces; Castiel and Dean slept through the whole thing. When Rufus had the lay of the land, he polished off his Coke and stood up.

"Bug-monks." Rufus shook his head at Sam. "Guess we didn't have enough evil sons of bitches running loose in the world."

"I guess not." Sam rummaged in his duffel and came up with the silver knife and the sword. "It's not complicated. Glowy knife, kerosene, sword, match--"

"Son, I've been on this job longer than you've been on this earth." Rufus pulled the sword out of its sheath and tested its weight and balance with quick, graceful twists of his hand. There was a dangerous gleam of malice and anticipation in his eyes. "I think I can figure this part out on my own; you just point me at 'em."

Sam flushed. "Yes, sir," he said on automatic. Rufus's face split in a broad, toothy grin, and Sam went even redder. "I mean. Yeah. Hang on, let me get the map."  
 

* * *

   
When the door closed, Dean rolled over and said, "Was that Rufus Turner?"

"The one and only." Sam went over to the bed and nudged at Dean's personal blanket fort. "Scoot over. I'm about to fall down."

"Don't come whining to me when you get whatever I got," Dean said, but he did move, hunching his body sideways toward the edge of the bed like an inch-worm. "What was he doing here?"

"Stand-in for Bobby. I guess he was in the neighborhood." Sam closed his eyes, just for a second. The bed underneath him was like a rock; it felt like he was lying on bare ground. "How are you feeling?"

"I'd say like Death, but I've met the guy, and I think he feels way better than this."

"Good thing you're not sick," Sam said, and then said "oof" when Dean elbowed him in the side. "Wonder what Bobby said to get him out here."

"Probably something like, 'the guys who saved the world need a hand with some pest control.'" Dean yawned so wide his jaw popped, then covered his mouth and yawned again. "We've got some credit built up."

Sam nodded. "We should get some sleep. It probably won't take him very long to torch what's left down there."

"Almost feel bad for 'em," Dean muttered, already drifting. "What did they ever do to deserve Rufus?"  
 

* * *

   
When Sam woke up several hours later, Dean was mashed up against his side like a bug on a windshield. His face was pressed into Sam's shoulder, forehead hot enough to brand a mark there. Sam fumbled his arm out from under the blanket and blinked at his watch until the numbers stayed still: 6:00 a.m.

He moved his shoulder experimentally; Dean just curled in closer. Sam rolled his eyes toward the ceiling. "One of these days," he said, in as threatening a voice as he could manage, and crawled out of bed. Dean made an angry noise like a baby walrus crying for its mama and burrowed into the warm spot Sam left behind.

The sun was just starting to lighten the sky outside, and Sam's breath drifted white into the cold pre-dawn air. He took a right toward the 7-11 glowing a green and orange promise of terrible coffee and Hostess snack cakes from the corner just a little way down the road. The girl behind the counter gave him a doubtful look when he got there, which was the first time it occurred to him he hadn't brushed his hair. He put down two thermometers, two more bottles of extra strength Tylenol, all the tissues he'd been able to find, and a cup of coffee bigger than the Impala's gas tank. Then he pushed his hair back from his face and smiled.

It didn't seem to help. She rang him up without a word, looking a little more frequently than was flattering at the camera mounted over the door. He threw a couple of Snickers bars and a packet of Ding Dongs onto the pile and dropped a credit card with the name _Ricardo Montalban_ on top of it all.

By the time he made it back to the motel, Dean was sitting up in bed with a pile of pillows at his back, hair sticking up even worse than Sam's. He was staring, glassy-eyed, at the television, light flickering across his face, sound turned down. When Sam tried to sneak through the door, Dean looked over, but didn't make any move to get out of bed.

Cas was still sleeping. At this point, Sam was a little worried Cas might be dead.

"Don't worry," Dean said. "I don't think you can wake him up. I threw the phone book at him a few minutes ago and he didn't even twitch."

Sam straightened up and stopped sneaking -- not that he'd been doing a great job of it. "You're looking better," Sam said. "I like the whole vertical thing you're trying out."

Dean snorted. "Not sure how well it's working for me. What's in the bag?"

Sam emptied it on the foot of the bed. Dean bypassed everything but the Ding Dongs, which he ripped into like he'd never seen food before. "Coffee?" he said around one of them, his cheeks distended, a blob of whipped cream smeared down his chin.

Sam took the lid off the cup, poured half of it into a glass from the bathroom, and handed it to Dean. He was out of the martyr business; if Dean wanted the rest he could damn well get out of bed and come after it.

"How are you feeling?"

"Like a burrito feels in a microwave." Dean washed the Ding Dong down with half the coffee, and held out his glass for more.

Sam sighed and uncapped his cup again. "You're going to need more Tylenol. And real actual food that doesn't come out of a foil wrapper."

"Nonsense, Sam," Dean said. "You got any idea what that kind of shock could do to my system? I might keel over on the spot. Comfort food, that's what my body needs. Something it's used to."

"Well, they didn't have any cheese-covered lard at the corner store. But the burgers from yesterday are in the fridge. You want me to nuke one?"

"Three," a deep, pained voice rasped from the other bed. Sam and Dean raised their eyebrows at each other and turned, as one, to look at Cas.

"You all right in there?" Dean said tentatively. All they could see was the top of Castiel's head, black hair greasy and unkempt. "Cas?"

A weak, pale hand flailed out from under the blankets and dragged them down off Castiel's face. His eyes were bloodshot, red-rimmed, and watery, and a day's growth of stubble darkened his cheeks and chin. He looked like a radio ad salesman on the wrong side of a Zombie Apocalypse.

"God is punishing me," he said.

Sam frowned. "For what?"

Castiel waved his hand in their general direction, rolling his eyes a little as if to say, _Hello? Have you met the two of you?_ "Consorting with humans," he said finally, when he'd rested up from waving.

"I thought you said that was allowed." Sam looked at Dean to see if he had any idea what Cas was talking about, but Dean had gone back to his stare-down with the television and didn't seem to be paying attention.

"It is allowed," he said. "It's not encouraged."

"Then why are you doing it?"

Cas heaved a sigh that seemed to come up from the depths of the earth. And then, more slowly, another. Sam had started to think breathing had used up all the angel's remaining energy when Castiel jerked in the next breath hard and said, "Your exposure has been quite limited, so you may not have noticed. Angels... are extremely boring."

In the second bed, Dean broke into a wild, raucous coughing fit while Sam bit down on his lower lip hard enough to draw blood. "Mmmmhm," he said, and turned away quickly, busying himself with the packaging of the two thermometers. He snuck a glance over at Dean, who steadfastly refused to meet his eyes, and poured two shots of Nyquil for his patients.

"Bottoms up," he said, handing them off. There was no argument from either of them this time; Dean didn't even make a face.

The dinky little microwave took three minutes to heat three burgers to an edible temperature. Cas finished both of his in the time it took Dean to finish one. Sam contemplated trying to stuff more medicine or food into one or both of them, but decided that was a little too motherly even for him. Anyway, they'd just whine about whatever he suggested -- Castiel was learning from the best -- so it was better to let them come around to the idea on their own.

He settled down next to Dean again, back up against the headboard, and commandeered the remote. It wasn't like Dean was tracking plotlines anyway; he could barely hold his head upright. He found a House Hunters marathon on one of the higher channels, and that was good enough for Sam; he could watch weirdly normal people look at non-haunted houses for hours and never get bored. It was kind of like peering through the glass into the monkey house at the zoo. Sometimes he wondered what it would be like for those nice couples in reverse. Probably like looking through the TV screen into Hell.

"You get used to it," he reassured Joe and Becca, who were looking to buy a new home closer to Joe's work in Philadelphia but having a little trouble with their financing.

"Hmmmph?" Dean said next to him, blinking gummy, vacant eyes.

"Nothing." Sam tucked the blanket closer around his brother and smiled. "Go back to sleep."  
 

* * *

   
Rufus came back around noon, knocking sharply at the door and almost falling inside when Sam opened it. His shoulders were slumped with exhaustion, his clothes reeked of smoke and kerosene, and one of his eyebrows looked about half singed off. There were odd little circular burns on the backs of both of his hands. And he was _pissed_.

Sam took a swift and careful step back. His own burns from the flaming monks the day before twinged in sympathy. "What happened to you?"

"'Kerosene, sword, match,'" Rufus said, mimicking Sam's delivery with an eerie accuracy. He pulled the silver knife Sam had given him off his belt and slapped it onto the table by the door. "'Not complicated.'" The sword landed next to it with a steely clatter. "The part where their blood burns the skin off any damn fool stupid enough to get near it -- that part, you just didn't feel like sharing?"

"Hey, I didn't know," Sam said, taking another step back before Rufus decided to take the swing he was clearly contemplating. Sam might be bigger, but Rufus was definitely madder; sometimes, that was enough to tip the scales. "None of them bled on me!" He looked over to Castiel for backup, because if Cas had known, he would have mentioned that at some point before Sam started stabbing them, right?

But Cas, only recently conscious and not fully himself yet, only blinked at Sam in confusion. "You didn't know?"

Sam narrowed his eyes and took a step toward Castiel's bed. "You _did_?"

"Of course," Castiel said patiently. "They're Abaddonites, Sam."

Sam took a deep breath and pressed the heel of his hand against his temple. He remembered, suddenly and clearly, the exact physical sensation of killing things with his brain. "Research," he said to himself in a strangled voice. "This is what happens when I don't work from primary sources."

Behind him, Rufus burst into a long, low riff of laughter. Sam turned, head tilted, glaring. "_What_?"

Rufus clapped a big, warm hand on Sam's shoulder and grinned. There was no trace of residual anger on his face; just genuine amusement. "Well, son," Rufus said, "I was thinking about popping you one, just to get us evened up. But between you and me? I'll take the bug-monks over the feather-brigade any day."

Sam let his mind drift pleasantly over the thought of something he could kill with steel and fire. He couldn't disagree. "How many did you take out?"

"Oh, all of 'em." Rufus grinned wider, showing all his teeth. "Just got a little roughed up around the edges in the process. You're gonna want to clean that," he said, nodding at the sword on the table. A hiss of smoke was rising from it -- cooking vinyl.

Sam closed his eyes and sighed. They were totally getting charged for that.

"Thanks," he said, reaching out to shake Rufus's hand. He tried to avoid the burns as much as he could. "I appreciate the help."

"You boys just return the favor next time you're in my neck of the woods." Rufus looked over at the Dean-shaped lump on the far bed. "If he makes it, that is."

"Oh, he'll make it," Sam said. "He's surprisingly difficult to kill."

Rufus gave a snort, shook his head, and went to the door. "Tell Singer I said we're even," he said. He slammed the door behind him hard enough to rattle the windows.

Dean shot up like a Jack-in-the-box, his eyes wide, checking every corner of the room. "Sam?"

"It's okay." Sam glared at the closed door. "That was Rufus. He had a little trouble with the monks. I think he was still a little pissed off."

Dean frowned. "What kind of trouble?"

"Apparently, they had concentrated acid for blood." Sam turned the glare on Castiel. "Thanks for the warning, by the way."

Castiel just blinked at him, blank-faced. Sam wondered how much of the confusion was coming from Dean's fever, and how much was just pure angelic bullshit. Given sophisticated mean-spiritedness of pretty much every other angel they'd ever met, Sam was starting to think Cas was either the most sheltered creature in all of Heaven, or playing the Winchester brothers severely.

Sam picked up the sword and took it to the bathroom, coming out with a towel that had seen whiter days. He dabbed experimentally at the yellowish goo staining the blade. It adhered to the towel, and the towel seemed to adhere to it, leaving the sword fuzzy and the towel yellow and smoking. Sam sighed. "I've got to go back down there," he said.

"What?" Dean whipped his head around to stare at Sam. "Why? Rufus didn't finish them off?"

"He did." Sam tossed the towel into the sink, a perfect shot. "I just want to check it out. Take a look around."

Dean's eyebrows went up. "We don't trust Rufus now?"

Sam shook his head, and threw Cas a petty, spiteful look. "We don't trust anybody."  
 

* * *

   


  
Standing outside of Lisa Braeden's house, Sam thought for maybe a minute about walking away. Breaking the cycle, like Dean kept saying they should. It made sense; they did care too much, they would risk too much for each other, over and over. It hadn't always been that way, but Sam had a feeling it was always going to be, if they stuck together. It worked for them, mostly. It just didn't always work out well for the world.

He watched Dean joke with Ben, smile up at Lisa. Have an intimate little family dinner. It was the kind of thing Dean had always loved, even when it was just him and Sam and Dad, even when it was just hot dogs and macaroni and cheese in a motel room, in some town whose name they couldn't remember. If Dean knew Sam was alive, if he knew Sam was _here_, there wouldn't be any contest. That wasn't arrogance or conceit; it was just experience. A lifetime of it.

Dean would be good for them, and maybe eventually, they'd be good for Dean, too. Not right now; the stiff set of Dean's shoulders, the distracted smiles, none of that said anything good about right now. But time might change that, if Dean let it. Time could make them a family, and maybe somewhere down the road Sam could come back, slot himself in along the sidelines, at a safe distance. Maybe that was what a normal guy would do, a less selfish guy than Sam had turned out to be. He thought about walking away and letting Dean have that. Letting Lisa and Ben have Dean.

And then he crossed the lawn and knocked on the door.   



  
 

* * *

   
Taking his duffel into the bathroom, Sam changed out of yesterday's jeans, underwear, T-shirt and flannel, and into today's. When he came back out, Dean was sitting on the edge of his bed attempting to dress himself in very slow motion. He had one sock off, his shirt off, and his jeans unbuttoned, and he was staring at his bag on the other side of the room like he could move it closer with his mind.

"What are you doing?" Sam asked, though he was pretty sure he already knew the answer. "Get back in bed, freak."

"Just give me a minute, and I'll be ready to go."

"Where? The hospital?"

Dean threw him a dark look and peeled off his other sock. "I told you," he said. "You're not going in there by yourself." He got up and wobbled his way around Castiel's bed, steadying himself on a chair so he could reach into his bag without falling over.

"Unbelievable," Sam told the ceiling. Then he told Dean, "You can't go. You can barely walk. And anyway, Rufus probably cleaned them all out already. I'm just double-checking."

"'Probably' doesn't cut it."

"You would be worse than useless. You'd be a liability. If you go, and there's any trouble at all, I'll probably get killed trying to save your germy ass. Please, Dean, just...get back in bed, and stop worrying. I'll be fine."

"I know you'll be fine," Dean said patiently. "Because I'm going."

"No, you're not."

"Yes, I am."

"Dean--"

"No, Sam. And don't give me that look, either. We've done too much, and come too far, for me to let you get smacked down by a leftover bug-monk in the armpit of nowhere because you decided to go off without backup. We go together, or nobody goes. And if you think a little case of the flu will stop me from putting your ass on the floor to make sure you stay put, you just try me."

Dean stood up straight and put himself in front of the door. He looked like crap; he did. And he was standing there shirtless and barefoot, unwashed and unshaven, a sheen of fever-sweat on his forehead, his hair greasy and disgusting. He looked like Death's sickly cousin, and fuck if he didn't look like he could kick Sam's ass anyway. He was just that pissed off.

Sam sank down onto the foot of Dean's unmade bed and bent over his knees, face in his hands. "Fuck," he said, the word muffled and deep. "Fuck, fuck, fuck."

"That's my boy," Dean said, rustling around in his bag, his attention clearly moving on to more important things. He always knew when he'd won. _Always._

Sam looked up, watched as Dean pulled on a clean shirt, stretching the fabric as he pulled it over his head. "I can't believe you're still doing this."

"It's cold outside, Sammy. And I have bird flu. Gotta bundle up."

Sam rolled his eyes. "This," he clarified, waving at the space between the two of them. "You still don't trust me. Still have to protect me, no matter what it costs you."

"It's not costing me anything but an extra big dose of Nyquil when I get back." Dean checked his gun and clip, tucked them away, and slid his jacket on to cover the bulge. "And it's not a trust thing, you should know better than that by now. It's an unnecessary risk thing. We don't do that anymore. Not if I have anything to say about it."

"When do I get to say something about it?"

Dean grinned. "When you stop saying such stupid things. You ready to go?"

"No." Sam pulled his gun out of the small of his back, popped the clip out, and put it on the table. Then he took off his jacket, toed off his boots, and sat down.

"Sam, for Christ's sake."

From a sound slumber, Castiel opened one bright, displeased eye and made a noise in the back of his throat like holy thunder.

"Sorry," Dean said. "For _fuck's_ sake."

Castiel's eye drifted closed.

Sam leaned forward, elbows on his knees, his eyes fixed on his brother's. "This is why you tried to get me to go back to school. This is why you've been so weird about the job lately. After everything that's happened, you still think it's your job to protect me from all the big bads in the world."

Dean snapped his gaze off to the side instantly. "Says the guy who wants to tuck me in and feed me soup till my sniffles are all better."

"You want to quit, we'll quit. Pack it in. Find a place up near Bobby's somewhere, find some work, whatever."

"I don't want to quit!"

"Then what the hell do you want, Dean?" Sam stood up, got up in Dean's face. His hands were itching to grab Dean and just shake him, shake some sense into him; he clenched his fingers tight to keep them still. "Because I can't work like this, with you looking over my shoulder every five minutes to make sure I haven't stubbed a toe or left a shoelace untied."

Dean looked pointedly around the room at the evidence of Sam's new career in nursing and shook his head, puffing out an annoyed breath. "The irony of that statement is just completely escaping you, isn't it."

Sam felt his cheeks growing warm, but didn't back down. "If you can't grasp the difference between me wanting you to rest when you're legit sick, and you wanting to hold my hand while I poke around an empty cave for hibernating monks I could take out on my own on my worst day--"

"I don't want to hold your hand! I just want you to be as smart as you think you are, okay? Jesus. _Sorry_," he snapped at Cas, who'd lifted his head up an inch off the pillow. "Don't you get it? We're finally safe, Sam. No big prophecies, no destiny, no deals with the devil or deities bent on fucking us up even worse than our parents did. Just you and me, and whatever we want to do." Dean put a hand on Sam's shoulder, a warm pressure that was comfort and home to Sam whether he liked it or not. "Is it so hard to understand why I might want us to slow down a little?"

"That's the problem. Right there. You may have been fighting all this time so we could be safe, Dean, but I've been fighting so we could be free. We did our part, and because of it Heaven's got our back now -- you said it yourself. Whatever happens between now and then, we get to do it on our own terms. Make our own choices."

"Right. Our own choices, as long as my choice is to sit back and watch you go running off half-cocked, any time you feel like it." Dean's hand fell away, and he took a step back, running his fingers through his hair. "I'm sick of worrying all the time," he said. "I'm done with that. I'm tapped out."

"Then stop it. Stop worrying about me. I beat down Lucifer, Dean; I can handle myself, if you let me."

Dean dropped down into a chair, legs kicked out wide in front of him. He rubbed at his forehead, and Sam hated how tired he looked, how worn down. He sat down in the chair next to Dean, hunched over the table, waiting.

A minute passed, and Dean let out a long sigh. "Whatever. Go. I'll stay here."

"No, I'll wait." Sam leaned back. "I'll wait till you're feeling better, and we'll both go."

Dean laughed, a low, grating sound. "You are one contrary son of a bitch, Sam, you know that?"

Sam grinned. "It's been said."

"This has been illuminating," Castiel said, sitting up. Sam turned to look at him, eyes wide, and beside him Dean did the same. "Dean, your concerns are understandable."

"_Thank_ you," Dean said, turning to Sam with a triumphant grin. "See, I told you--"

"But Sam is correct."

"--Hey!"

"Until your inevitable deaths, Heaven has no further claim on you," Castiel told Dean, "and Hell is frankly too terrified to come near you. Nothing in between has ever posed more than a momentary danger to you or your brother."

"See," Sam said, "that's my whole _point_. And with Cas here looking out for us--"

"On the contrary." Cas stood up. "Your freedom is the point. And my protection is as much a burden in this regard as Dean's is. Therefore, I have decided to dissolve the guardian angel bond between your brother and me, and in the future only check in socially."

Sam said, "...you have?" just as Dean was saying, "...the _what_?"

In an instant, Castiel's face regained its color; his posture regained its dignity and poise, his eyes cleared, and his hair seemed to get cleaner as Sam watched. All traces of illness faded, leaving him looking serene, pure, and angelic once again. He straightened the collar of his shirt, which was suddenly far cleaner than it had any right to be, and with a tiny smile, set about looking for his shoes.

"You wuss," Sam said, slightly awed by the extent of Castiel's self-interest. "You did that just to get rid of your flu symptoms!"

Castiel's cheeks colored, but he held firm. "Had that been my only purpose, I could have simply cured Dean in the first place."

"You could--" Dean stood up, went over, and poked Cas in the shoulder. "You could have just cured me? At any time over the past day and a half, you could've just snapped your fingers and--"

Dean stopped mid-sentence, his eyes going wide as his eyebrows came down in a sudden, confused frown. He wobbled for a second, flailing out a hand; Sam caught him by the shoulders and kept him upright, just barely.

Castiel smiled beatifically. "As you can see, snapping my fingers was not necessary."

Dean -- abruptly cleaner, healthier, and madder than he'd been in days -- shook himself free of Sam's hands and straightened up to his full height, looming dangerously. "The fuck took you so long?"

"Interference in human affairs--"

"Do not even start that shit with me," Dean said, looming harder.

Castiel raised his eyes to the ceiling and sighed. "Look. Just stay in the room for a few more hours and if anybody asks, it was a twenty-four hour thing."

Dean said, "And what the hell is a _guardian angel bond_\--?" but before he was halfway through it, Castiel made a sound like a TV shorting out and was gone.

Tilting his head, Sam said, "That never happened before. Did he make that noise on purpose?"

"Dude. After the past five minutes, that's your major concern? The sound effects?"

"It just wasn't very dignified."

Dean snorted. "You should've seen him in the Mirror Universe. Not quite goatee territory, but the five o'clock shadow was epic."

"Scary," Sam said -- and while he was trying to picture it, he started to sneeze.  
 

* * *

   
The cavern was colder than Sam remembered. Even bundled up in layers and a jacket on top of that, hands in gloves and stuffed deep into his pockets, his teeth were chattering. Dean led the way, humming under his breath, a faint bloom of health coloring his cheeks in the light from the torches. There was a spring in his step, and a cheerful lack of concern for Sam's misery in his eyes.

Sam sneezed again, and tried to wipe his nose against his sleeve without removing his hands from his pockets.

"You sound pretty awful," Dean said. "Do you think Cas got rid of my antibodies, too? It would really suck if you contaminated me all over again."

"Yeah," Sam said around the wad of phlegm collecting at the back of his throat. "That would be just awful." He sped up a little, puffing hard in Dean's direction.

They reached the bottom of the passageway and peered out into the gloom of the main cavern. There was a distinctly acrid flavor to the air, and strange charred shapes littered the ground around them. Dean crossed to the other side, poking into every nook and cranny, just to be sure, but it was pointless. The only things left alive in the whole place were Winchesters.

"I'm just gonna go ahead and say from now on, we should put Rufus back on the 'can be counted on to deliver the beatdown' list."

"He tied me to a chair and poured salt and holy water down my throat," Sam said. "I've got some residual trust issues."

"That was over a year ago. And he thought you were a demon, man."

"Well, I _wasn't_!"

Dean rolled his eyes. "Whatever. He's A-OK in my book. He can have my share of the world's bug-monks, no questions asked."

Sam sighed, and looked back the way they'd come. It had been a very long way down; it looked like it was gonna be an even longer trip up. His legs felt like rubber, if rubber could be made out of lead. "Cas isn't coming back, is he," Sam said despondently. He was going to be stuck with the flu forever. He could feel it taking up permanent residence in his bones.

"Not for a while. Not if the little bastard knows what's good for him." Dean glared upwards, in the absence of an angel to take the heat in person. "He totally mind-fucked me the very first day we met. And he didn't even buy me dinner after."

"But that was over a _year_ ago," Sam said.  
 

* * *

   
Back topside, Sam draped both arms over the cool black roof of the car and pressed his face against the metal. The chills had given way to a sensation Sam imagined was not unlike the last conscious moments of a bug-monk's life. Dean started the engine to get the heat going, a plan Sam didn't have the energy to protest, and came around to lean against the door next to him.

"You're the one who didn't want to be safe," Dean pointed out.

Sam croaked, "Thanks for the empathy," and let out a hot, infectious breath in Dean's direction.

"Get in." Dean nudged at his shoulder. "Before you fall down." He opened the door for Sam and braced him as he fell inside in a bone-clattering heap.

"Ow," Sam said. He shifted, trying to arrange himself into a less achy configuration of limbs.

Dean made sure all parts of Sam were inside the vehicle and went around to his side. The car rocked a little as he dropped into it and slammed the door. Sam watched out of slitted, bleary eyes as Dean rubbed his hands together, then blew into the space between his fingers, trying to warm up. Sam was starting to feel a little chilly again, too.

He waited for Dean to get them moving, but Dean didn't seem in a hurry. He ran his hands over the steering wheel, stopping at ten and two. He stared out the windshield, which was slowly fogging over with their breath.

After a minute, Sam said, "Just come out and say it, whatever it is." He wrapped his arms tight around his middle, and hoped it looked like he was doing it for the warmth. "I can handle it."

Dean cut a quick glance in Sam's direction, then turned his eyes back to the window. His face was a blank slate, the way it only got when he was trying way too hard to keep his cool. "I don't know. We've been here a lot of times, and it doesn't seem to make much difference."

"I'm not asking you to stop worrying," Sam said. "I know that's like asking the sun not to shine. I just need you to cut the apron strings."

"I did, and you went to Hell. I couldn't back you up, and I lost you." Dean's hands clenched around the steering wheel. "You did good. You did what you had to do, and I know it. But short of another end of the world, I can't handle that again, Sammy." Dean shook his head. "_Sam_. I can't. And you couldn't handle it the other way around, so don't tell me you don't know how it feels."

"I understand that, but--"

"No, you don't. You're so fired up to prove you can kick the ass of every spook in the cemetery with both hands tied behind your back, you don't seem to care if I'm backing you up or not." Dean twisted his hands around the grip of the steering wheel. "That doesn't work for me."

Sam looked at Dean, and if not for the white-knuckle tension in his hands, he might have thought none of this was touching his brother at all. His face was perfectly still and composed. But that tension ran up his arms and into his shoulders when Sam was looking for it, into the set of his mouth, the buffer of reserve in his eyes.

"This isn't about you not trusting me," Sam said slowly. The idea hit him in stages, too big and too weird to take in all at once. "This is about me not trusting you."

Dean didn't look at him, didn't shrug, didn't so much as twitch.

"You know that's not right. You _know_ I do."

"You've been pushing us from job to job all year like we're still racing demons to seals, Sam. I say we need to take some down time, rest up so we don't fuck up the next gig, and you act like I've insulted your manhood -- such as it is -- and sign us up for more." Dean's eyes met his, mad and tired and _hurt_, which was like a punch in the gut to Sam, because he never saw this coming. "Hell, I was glad to get the flu. At least I got a few hours sleep in a bed instead of the car."

"I'm sorry," Sam said, instantly, wanting to erase that look as fast as possible. The apology came easy, because Dean was wrong. But he was a little bit right, too. Sam did run ahead; he did have things to prove. Maybe he'd been trying to prove the wrong things, though. Maybe that was the problem. "I do trust you," Sam said gently, giving Dean's shoulder a quick shake. "You're really, really stupid if you don't believe that."

Dean raised his eyebrows. "Those are some mad reconciliation skills you've got there, Sam. I'm impressed."

"Look. I know I have kind of a thing about doing things on my own. It doesn't mean I don't trust you." Sam swallowed around the lump in his throat that was mostly comprised of his pride. "You're my big brother. My _stem cells_ trust you. It's not like I have any choice in the matter."

Dean nodded, and it wasn't like there was any big change or anything, but the rigid line of his shoulders relaxed a little, his hands lightened up on the wheel. "Goes both ways. I could probably mention that more."

"You could," Sam said, smiling. "I could maybe mention you were right. I shouldn't have tried to ditch you."

"Awww, Sam." The last of Dean's tension bled out of him like it was never there to start with. He clapped a hand on Sam's shoulder, an expression of deeply overwrought gratitude on his face. "Thanks. That means a lot to me. Especially since I know it half kills you to say it out loud like that."

Sam shook off his brother's hand, glaring. "You're welcome. Ass."

Dean shook his head, still grinning, and put the car in gear. Sam slouched down in his seat, letting the vibrations of the rumbling engine sink into his bones. Muscles he didn't even know were tense unknotted themselves along his spine. His eyes slipped closed; he was dozing before they even started moving.

"Let's get you back to bed, Sammy," Dean said quietly, edging them out into traffic. "You sleep. I'll find us someplace with cable."  
 

* * *

   


  
_Sammy_, Sam thought, disgust and affection warming him as much as the air blowing out of the heater. He'd never hated the name quite as much as he felt like he should. And Dean was never going to stop using it, so it was just as well. He didn't really mind it, not at times like this; not when he was sore and sick and tired right down to the core.

Actually, times like this? He kind of liked it.  



  
 

* * *

   
end

 

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